HISTORY
204 - MINIMALISM
(F-11)
1. Minimalism
designates a style that arose in the mid-60s and thrived until the 80s
Was
seen at the time as a reaction against the domination of modern music by serialism,
against the complexity of serial organization
- Minimalist composers wrote pieces based on simplest means possible
“Minimalism”
means different things to different
people – Do “minimalist pieces” have anything in common?
Simple
textures - few vertical or horizontal complications - only one or 2 things
going on at a time - easy for listener to hear what's going on - "listener-friendly"
Tonal
- i.e. a) based on overtone series, and b) clear tonic sense for long stretches
- However rarely based on common-practice harmonies – rarely organized by
cadence
New
approach to harmony – harmonies not established by contrapuntal, chord-to-chord
voice leading – more like a cloud of harmonies
New
approach to form - Nothing has to "happen" in a piece, the form of
the piece doesn't have to be marked by "events" like themes,
cadences, etc. - Piece becomes more "process," less
"product"
New
sense of time - Time suspended by stasis and repetition - not marked by musical
arrivals and departures
Some
of these features have evolved or disappeared over the period 1965-2000 - By
now very little new music can be
identified as "minimalist" in style, but we can still speak of
minimalist techniques
2. Minimalist
compositional techniques developed during 60s
- many of the characteristic techniques derived from electronic music
techniques:
Repetition - tape loops, repeated instrumental patterns
Incremental change
- Each pattern very similar to contiguous patterns - process of gradual shifts
(may be written out or left to performers)
Phasing - i.e. playing pattern against itself - canon
at very close interval - Based on tape multi-tracking (This technique turned up
in pop music too - e.g. Brian Eno, King Crimson)
Where
did we hear these techniques in electronic music?
repetition
– Schaeffer, Studies; Oswald, Birth; Dodge, Days
incremental
change – Wang, Flaherty;
phasing
– Flaherty, Dodge
(if
time) Example: "It's Gonna
Rain" (1965) – Reich took the voice of a street-corner preacher in
Union Square, broke it down into its component sounds and looped it against
itself – PLAY
Reich's
slogan: "Music as a gradual process"
(Prep 9)
3. Steve Reich –
Piano Phase (1967) (Supplementary)
Example
of similar techniques applied to instrumental music – Again repetition,
incremental change, phasing
2
pianos play the same simple, 16th-note pattern – 12 notes at the
beginning – Piano 1 begins, piano 2 enters in unison
Then
piano 2 begins to speed up slightly – For a while the two pianos are “out of
phase,” i.e. their notes aren’t together – As piano 2 continues a little
faster, the 1st 16th of its pattern reaches the 2nd
16th of piano – Now the pianos are back “in phase,” but the
counterpoint is different – Each of these different contrapuntal patterns are
shown on the score – the “out of phase” sections are shown as repeat marks in
between
After
12 different combinations – and 12 “out of phase” transitions, the 2 pianos are
in unison again – Then they move to pattern 2, which has only 8 notes – After
all those combinations are exhausted they move to pattern 3 which is only 4
notes – Thus the effect over the entire piece is like a stretto
Good
performers will stretch this process for quite a long time, reveling in the
“out of phase” sections
This
music requires active listening - listeners create patterns for themselves,
especially in the out-of-phase sections – At a given moment, one listener may
be hearing a different pattern from what his neighbor hears [like the
duck-rabbit or old-young woman drawings]
4. Steve Reich – Tehillim
(1981) NAWM 197
Setting
of four Biblical Psalms (Tehillim is the Hebrew name
of the Book of Psalms – literally it means "praises") – Example in
NAWM is Psalm 150 ("Praise him with drum and dance, etc")
After
the "phase" compositions of the 1960s Reich began experimenting with
music for larger ensembles and more complex textures – used same techniques
(repetition, incremental change, phasing) to develop larger structures where
events happen on several different levels (not just micro level as in Piano
Phase) – Example was Music for 18 Musicians (1976): striking at the time as
more lyrical and for longer-range harmonic development
Tehillim
was first Reich piece that set words – Reich had used words in the electronic
pieces, but hadn't really set them; he used voices in 18 Musicians but not
words – Text isn't comprehensible, but word meanings (praise and rejoicing) are
very clearly set
Same
techniques of repetition, phasing, incremental change – But repetition doesn't
last as long as Piano Phase (and other earlier pieces) and is distributed over
many more parts as canon – phasing isn't gradual, but sudden shifts, global
changes added to incremental
Divided
into sections (double bars) – each section sets new line of text and has
different texture from previous section – Thus change doesn't seem so
incremental, more sudden and goal-oriented – sections outlined and described in
NAWM table
Rhythms
– very rapid 8th, grouped alternately into 2s and 3s according to
stressed and unstressed syllables – symbols above violin part tell conductor
how to beat (triangle is long beat (three 8ths), stroke is short beat (two
8ths)
Has
Tehillim abandoned Reich's "Music as a gradual
process" ideology?
5. Arvo Pärt (b. 1935) – “O Wisdom” and “O King of all peoples”
(NAWM 170) – from 7 Magnificat Antiphons (1988/ rev.
1991)
Example
of another kind of minimalism that has little or nothing to do with electronic
music techniques – We could call this “spiritual
minimalism” because it’s goal is to attain or introduce meditation or
heightened consciousness – Other composers who engage in “spiritual minimalism”
include Terry Riley, LaMonte Young
Based
on simplest possible musical materials: diatonic pitches, triadic harmonies, drones,
stepwise movement of voices, repetition of elements
Pärt
is Estonian – Came to this style via a) serialism; b) study of plainchant,
Renaissance polyphony and JS Bach; c) religious conviction – None of these
endeared him to Soviet music establishment – Pärt
emigrated to Germany in 1980
Antiphons
are example of Pärt’s “Tintinnabuli” (bells) technique, which he
developed in 70s – a very “minimal” technique for harmonizing a tune – Each
note of the tune is harmonized with the closest note of the triad on the
keynote – something like fauxbourdon - effect is that we hear a triad “ringing”
throughout the piece – this could be considered an extremely simple serial
technique
“O
Weisheit” (p.
1412) – PLAY – Tune is in tenor in 3rds– Every other word is harmonized with an
A-major triad (even though the melody may have a note that isn’t in the triad)
- Effect is like bells ringing in A
major throughout the piece
“O
König” (p. 1414) – Similar technique but canonic – Same
melody in tenor 2 and soprano 2 – They sing mensuration canon
– Tenor is twice as fast, so when he finishes he sings the inversion – Alto
chants words on D – other voices sing D minor triad according to rule above
PLAY – try to sing along with S-2 or T-2
Study
the NAWM notes on this piece, which are good
5. Maturing of minimalism
in 80s
Simple
textures and tonal orientation of minimalism have proved popular with audiences
Techniques,
sounds and clichés of minimalism have been pursued by composers who don't share
mystical or "music as process" aesthetic – Minimalism has pretty much
outlived its origins as a reaction to serialism
Original
band of composers (Reich, Glass) have turned away from phasing and looping
towards more through-composed and more lyrical techniques (Terry Riley and LaMonte Young have remained more true to the original
vision)
New
composers have adopted techniques like repetition, layering, phasing into much
more complicated textures (e.g. John Adams)
New
compositions are more about product or meaning than about process
4.
John Adams (b. 1947) – Short Ride in a Fast Machine (1986)– NAWM 198
"Fanfare
for Orchestra" – for MTT
Example
of escalation of minimalist techniques to create great complexity (NAWM
analysis points this out) – Is this culmination or subversion of minimalism?
Adams
(b. 1947) bio and works
Harvard
trained
At
SFCM 1972-82 – Involved with tape music center, various avant
garde projects –
Phrygian Gates
(1977) for Mack McCray, Shaker Loops (1978), Harmonium (1981), Harmonielehre (1984) – All these use minimalist techniques
of repetition and incremental change
But
Adams was much more interested in harmony than other "minimalist"
composers – These pieces feature harmonic effects similar to Reich/Glass
rhythmic and contrapuntal effects – Harmonic change without voice-leading,
without cadences – "clouds of harmony" slowly changing throughout the
piece (or sometimes changing suddenly as in Phrygian Gates)
Nixon in China (1987)
– dir. Peter Sellars – Based on Nixon's visit to the
People's Republic in 1971 – Very successful – doesn't tell a story but presents
a succession of scenes based on real events – Music tends to be static for
duration of scene – Effecting setting of very repetitive text ("News, news,
news") –
Subsequent
operas not as successful – Death of Klinghofer (1991)
accused (unjustly) of anti-Semitism ; Dr. Atomic (2005) had last-minute,
ineffectual libretto
Short
Ride
Good
analysis in NAWM – Two big points: 1) rhythmic ambiguity: shifting meters,
overlapping meters; 2) 2 harmonic procedures: a) gradual addition of pitches to
collection; b) sudden harmonic changes ("gates")
by adding or (more often) subtracting notes so we suddenly hear a new
collection
Example
of overlapping rhythms at beginning – woodblock vs. brass vs. winds – examples
of shifting meters from m. 14 on – PLAY from beginning
Example
in same passage of gradually adding pitches to collection – PLAY again
Example
of "gate" at m.52 (cue 36) – from E major (more or less) to Bb major
(more or less) – But both pitch collections are more complicated, not triadic –
PLAY
Is
this "music as an audible process"? – Quite the opposite, I think